Sumner County

Living history at Mansker's Station

Living history is big in Sumner County.

In 1780 a settler named Kasper Mansker built a fort along the banks of the creek in Sumner County now named for him. Settlers had to abandon that fort because of Native American raids, but he returned and built another fort about a mile north of that first one. This second Mansker's Station was an important staging post in early Middle Tennessee.

Today they have living history events at a replica of Mansker's Station in Goodlettsville.

Rock Castle

Also in Sumner County you will find Rock Castle, the home of Daniel Smith. Smith, born in Virginia in 1748, was a surveyor – an important job to have when most of what we now call the United States wasn’t even mapped.

In the winter of 1779-1780, which is the exact time that people were coming to settle Nashville, he helped survey the border between Tennessee and Kentucky (which at that time was the border between North Carolina and Virginia.) He liked what he saw so much that he came back a few years later and built Rock Castle.

Living history at Rock Castle

They also stage living history events at Rock Castle.

Living history at Bledsoe's Fort

On the eastern edge of Sumner County is the site of a former settlement called Bledsoe's Fort.

Yet another place where living history events are staged!

And here's the Sumner County Courthouse, which looks very similar in style to the courthouses in Davidson, Obion and Polk counties.

The view seems to be dominated by the "Do Not Enter" sign, doesn't it?